Oh, hey, it's the moldy pumpkin you carved a little too early. Allie Ward, let's enjoy some poisons.

I love this guest. I first met her at a book reading over 10 years ago, and I have always enjoyed

so much her historical science writing. She studied chemistry, but she majored in journalism.

More on that in a bit. And got a master's degree in environmental journalism, went on to write a whole stack of

books like Monkey Wars and Ghost Hunters, William James, and the search for scientific proof of life

after death, and of course the beloved The Poisoners Handbook, Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine

in Jazz Age, New York. And she also authored the recent tactical guide to science journalism and is writing a new book as we spoke.

And how good is she?

She's a Pulitzer Prize winner.

She will tell us all about the history of toxicology and the poisons of then and now.

But first, thank you to patrons of ollogies who support the show for a book,

a month, or more. And to send in questions for The Ologist before we record, thanks to everyone in Ologiesmerch from Ologiesmerch.com. And if you need shorter classroom safe episodes of Ologies, we have Smologies and their own podcast feed. So you can look for S-M-O-L-G-I-E-S. It's called Smologis.

And thank you, as always, to folks who support the show by leaving reviews, which I creep on, such as this recent one from Solar Bear,

whose review said, oh, ologies, never go away, the best little reliable landing spot for the weird

wonders around the world. Solar Bear, I will do this until I fire myself. Okay, so

toxicology, it means poison. It comes from old French and Latin words for poisoned arrow,

which came from an older word, meaning a yew tree from which the bows were made. So toxins,

toxic, poisons, it's got some tree roots in there. So let's get into

metal poisons, odorless poisons, toxic gases, Iocaine powder, arsenic, old lace,

poisons as self-defense, black mirrors, movie myths, and the start of testing for that which

ails or kills you with author, Chemistry Connoisseur,

and someone who really knows the history of toxicology, Deborah Blum, she her.

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